On December 19 of this year, Lionel Messi won the trophy he was missing: the World Cup, which this year was held in Qatar. The Argentine star was even considered the best player in the competition.
With Messi under all the spotlights, social networks took the opportunity to re-share an old theory, which curiously began to be shared in 2014, one day after Argentina reached the World Cup final in Brazil (this time with a different outcome, Messi ended up losing against Germany).
On Facebook a long, long text highlights the “story of overcoming and inspiration” of the number 10 of Argentina: “Messi is autistic. He was diagnosed at the age of 8, still in Argentina, with Asperger’s Syndrome., known as a mild form of autism.” In the lines that follow, the text explains that the athlete’s diagnosis was “little publicized and questioned, as a way of protecting him”, and concludes that “his behavior on and off the pitch is an example of improvement and inspiration for the town”.
Post on Facebook with text about Lionel Messi’s alleged autism
But in fact, Messi was never diagnosed with any type of autism. The family of the captain of Argentina immediately denied the text, when it began to be shared on social networks (and since then more than eight years have passed). Lionel Messi’s father even sued former Brazil international Romário for sharing this same fake news. Romário ended by explaining that the text he had shared on Twitter was not his authorship, but that this had not prevented the Argentine player’s family from going ahead with a lawsuit.
The family’s reaction was followed by explanations from the player’s personal doctor. In an interview with the Brazilian newspaper UOL (Universo Online), Diego Schwarzstein left no room for doubt: “Leo was never diagnosed with Asperger’s or any other form of autism.”
Conclution
It is not true that Lionel Messi was diagnosed with autism at the age of eight or at any time in his life. The publication on Facebook about the story of overcoming and inspiration” of the Argentine number 10 ensures that the diagnosis of Asperger syndrome was “little publicized and questioned, as a way to protect it.” This false news was even shared by Romário, who ended up being sued by Messi’s father. Both the family and the doctor of the Argentine guarantee that “Leo was never diagnosed with Asperger’s or any other form of autism.” Curiously, or not, these rumors are shared more every time Lionel Messi reaches a World Cup final.
Thus, according to the Observer classification system, this content is:
WRONG
In the Facebook rating system this content is:
FALSE: Main content claims are factually inaccurate. This option generally corresponds to “fake” or “mostly fake” ratings on fact check sites.
NOTE: This content was curated by The Observer as part of a fact-checking partnership with Facebook.
Source: Observadora
